BACK COVER
BLURB:
Children’s author Emily Sinclair was supposed to be the next
J.K. Rowling… Until her second book flopped and her imagination went on the
fritz. So she sets out on an epic adventure to find inspiration again. Till a
dead car lands her in Covington Falls, Georgia. Soon Emily is taking up her
quest, looking for inspiration driving a mobile library van, as a companion to
a crotchety old woman and her insomniac dog, and as a very ungraceful baker’s assistant. Of course, what really sparks
her romantic fantasies is a valiant hero, though he yields a paint roller
instead of a sword.
Rugged, blue-collar Nate Cooper has spent most of his life
avoiding the printed page. These days he doesn’t have much use for fancy words
and certainly not for a slightly off-center writer on the lam. Not when his
mother is battling cancer, his little brother has morphed into a teenaged ogre,
and God seems to have taken a vacation.
On paper, these two would seem the least likely pairing, and
a happily ever after nothing but fantasy. But with faith and imagination Emily
and Nate are about to write a new chapter that will lead to unexpected love.
Excerpt:
Chapter One
A stomach-churning
thunk. A disaster-laden chug. A scary, threatening gurgle.
Emily
Sinclair’s hands clutched the steering wheel as she guided her how-could-you-give-out-on-me-now convertible to the side of the road.
With a last ominous blunk and splutter, the car gave up the ghost.
She switched
off the engine, waited a few seconds, and then turned the key again. Nothing.
Not surprising.
As if anything glug-glugging like an
octogenarian trying to cough up a lung was going to restart with so little
effort.
A cranky yowl went
up from the passenger seat. Emily glanced over at the pet carrier and sent the
fat Persian inside a confident smile. “Don’t worry, Wordsworth. This is why
modern man invented cell phones.”
She fished her
phone out of her purse. A blank screen stared back at her. Pressing more
buttons did nothing.
Dead.
Dead as her
car.
With a sound of
disgust, Emily tossed the useless phone aside and stared out the windshield at
the deserted country road in front of her. The very deserted country road that stretched around a sparkling blue
lake and disappeared into the back of beyond. The kind of road featured in all
the best horror stories. Emily’s mind conjured up every one, along with the
opening line in the newspaper article.
Once-famous children’s author found mangled
to death. Quest to locate her lost imagination and revive faded career ends in
disaster… as her mother predicted.
Muttering an
oath, Emily climbed out of the car and slammed the door as hard as she could.
What a fix. And ironic. There were rules about writing. Not grammar rules, like
where to put commas or when to use a semicolon. No, the unofficial rules for
fiction writing. Chief among them is that an author should never start a novel
with the character driving or thinking. No, readers wanted action right off the
top, and the car could never break down.
In college,
Emily had written a short story where the heroine’s car stalled in a typical
these-people-will-murder-you-in-your-sleep town. Emily’s professor had written cliché in bold, red pen across the page.
Not satisfied, she’d added boring cliché,
underlining the boring with three
thick red lines. The critique had stung. The fact that it had come courtesy of
Professor Vanessa Sinclair, Emily’s mother, had been like ripping off an old
bandage.
Emily was
breaking all three cardinal rules of writing at once. Though technically the
driving rule didn’t apply. Same for the sitting rule. She was thinking, though.
Thinking her entire life had become a cliché, so what did it matter if she
broke her mother’s precious writing rules? She was a one-hit writing wonder. A
flash in the pan. A big-haired eighties’ rock band that had scored one giant
hit and then disappeared into the oblivion of those nostalgic ‘Where are they now?’ music specials.
Emily sighed.
If one had to break down somewhere, one could do worse than… what had the sign
said back there? Covington something. Covington something, Georgia. Muted
afternoon sun shimmered off the surface of the lake. She lifted a hand to ward
off the eye-watering glare and focused on the water. In her previous life, the
golden flecks of sunlight reflecting off its surface would have transformed
into a million different kinds of fantastical creatures. Or maybe something
nightmarish would charge out of that bank of oak trees across the lake.
Unfortunately,
Emily was stuck in her real life, and her imagination was on the fritz.
Well, at least
she wouldn’t die of water deprivation while she waited to be rescued.
Speaking of
rescue.
A car had
appeared, winding around the curve of the lake. A big ole’ country truck
calling to mind hoedowns and hay rides. A big ole’ rusty truck, Emily realized as it drew closer. Burnt red growth
spread out across the hood like a marauding band of Vikings overtaking a defenseless
village. She imagined rust was the only thing holding the vehicle together.
The truck
slowed and Emily tensed, torn between elation at being found and wariness
regarding exactly who might be behind the wheel of the ancient rattletrap. The
glare off the windshield made it impossible to see inside the cab, however.
The tires
veered off to the side of the road and stopped, sending up a cloud of dust.
Emily waved her hand, choking on the airborne dirt. Her mouth felt dry as if
she had licked the ground. The door opened. Work boots emerged. Brown and
roughed-up and covered in… paint. A man stepped out, and Emily steadied her
hands against the car to keep from falling over.
Mr. Darcy. No,
Heathcliff. Only instead of a cravat and breeches, he was dressed in faded
jeans and a black T-shirt, which seemed molded to an impressive chest. Heath
stretched up a good six-plus feet, towering over her puny five-foot-two frame.
A lock of dark chocolate-brown hair brushed over his forehead. Their eyes met.
Since she was already thinking in clichés, Emily’s mind offered up a million of
them to describe his eyes. She could start with gray, but no way did such a
mundane word do them justice. Slate, storm clouds, a roiling sea, glazed
pewter. Devastating, and framed by thick sooty lashes no man had a right to
possess.
He stopped a
few feet away, and Emily had the fanciful notion he was trying not to frighten
her. Like she was a skittish filly about to bolt.
“Hi,” he said.
“Car trouble?”
His voice was
like his eyes. Smooth and deep, like honey in a cup of hot tea.
Emily nodded.
How could she speak when every male literary fantasy she’d ever dreamed about
had unfolded from a rusted-out pickup?
“You okay?” he
asked. “You didn’t have an accident? Knock your head on anything?”
“No. Just a car
that decided to die,” Emily said, finally finding her voice. “Along with my
cell. Although that’s my fault since I didn’t charge it last night, even though
my mother is always nagging me not to forget, since I’ve taken it into my head
to wander the globe on an aimless search
for purpose and meaning. Her description anyway, but if you’d lost your
imagination wouldn’t you go to the ends of the earth to find it again? She
doesn’t understand, though. Although maybe she’s right. I mean, here I am stuck
in Covington something, Georgia, with a dead car, a dead cell, and a dead
imagination. Although if I had an
imagination I know I could come up with something fantastic about your truck.”
Emily slapped a
hand over her mouth, horrified by the verbal diarrhea she’d just unleashed on
her hapless rescuer.
The stranger
stared at her for a moment, and then did the most unexpected thing. He grinned.
“What was that?”
Her butt
thumped against the hood of the car as her legs gave out. Oh, Heath had a smile
on him that could tempt any fair maiden to let down her hair. Or anything else
he wanted.
Buy Links:
Barnes &
Noble: http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/imagine-that-kristin-wallace/1119886610?ean=2940149785476
ABOUT THE
AUTHOR:
Growing up Kristin devoured books like bags of Dove Dark
Chocolate. Her first Golden Book led
to Laura Ingalls Wilder, Nancy Drew, C.S. Lewis and the Sweet Valley High
series. Later, she discovered romance novels and fell in love all over again.
It’s no surprise then that Kristin would one day try her hand at
writing them. She writes romance and women’s fiction filled with love,
laughter and a leap of faith. She is the author of Covington Falls Chronicles,
inspirational romances set in a quirky, Southern town with a character all it’s
own. When she’s not writing her next novel, Kristin works as an
advertising copywriter. She also enjoys singing in the church choir and
worship team and playing flute in a community orchestra.
Covington Falls
Chronicles: Marry Me (Book 1); Acting
Up (Book 2); Imagine That (Book 3)
Connect with Kristin:
Website: www.KristinWallaceAuthor.com
Twitter: https://twitter.com/KWallaceAuthor
